By Clara Ng
Mother, how are you? I’ve brought you flowers, so you’ll always be happy.
Neni took two steps forward dragging her left leg—her shorter leg—behind her. She listed and swayed, like a ship rolling against the swell of the sea. She sank to the earth before a simple grave, reaching forward to put a wreath of tiny yellow flowers on it. She tidied the grave, carefully pulling up the weeds that had sprouted around it, tossing aside the stalks of rotting flowers, the broken twigs, the dry debris. It was a ritual she always performed whenever she visited her mother’s grave.
A dry wind lapped around her, stirring the dust, throwing up sooty motes of earth. There was a stew of decay in the air. Faintly but distinctly Neni could smell its rich blend of frangipani and incense with a sour hint of blood. She ignored the smells. The sky was almost clear, but clouds were advancing over the tiny burial ground, blanketing it in gray. Dark shadows fell over its nooks and corners. The markers of graves jutted in rows from the earth as if reaching up from the maw of hell.
The sun rose higher in the sky like the giant hand of a great clock telling Neni it was time to go home. She pressed her hand against the edge of the grave, taking her weight on it to steady herself as she rose to her feet. Then, with her swaying walk, she moved away without looking back. Behind her a shadow lingered, dark and still.
A woman stood at the door. Her eyes glared unblinking from a dark face. Her skin had been lifted and stretched unnaturally taut over her cheekbones. She was wearing an immaculate formal dress. In her free hand she held a clasp bag—the most opulent item in the room. It was made of leather embossed with a logo radiating more magic power than any religious icon could. Even the most distant nostrils caught the soft scent of her perfume. It was a rich blend of frangipani with cloves, hints of vanilla and orange peel.
The woman let her gaze float over the room. It was a spacious room, but its walls had faded, and in the corners the floor tiles were cracked. Several staff in blue uniforms sat in dilapidated plastic chairs along the walls. Down at the end of the corridor an elderly man was slowly swinging a mop left and right over the floor. A three-legged dog was lying in one corner, looking up with mournful eyes.
Neni walked, swaying over to the woman. Three cats moved away with thin meows. One of them leapt up onto a high shelf and looked down at what was happening below. For an instant the animal sat frozen like a porcelain ornament. But it could not conceal its blind eye, the dull white right eye, staring vacantly at some distant place, not at all like the other eye, green and bright and limpid as a topaz.
Neni went through the motions of greeting the woman. The woman looked back coldly then turned and called to someone behind her. A man carrying a basket hurried in. Neni knew what was in the basket. Without any questions she took it from him. Businesslike, the woman quickly completed some paperwork and left without a further word.
Neni stood still. She could feel something wriggling inside the basket. Sadness tugged at her and she lowered the basket. Slowly a brown furry creature crawled out. A dog. It looked up apprehensively, trying to stand on violently trembling legs. It seemed helpless, weak, pale. And it was terrified. Its left shoulder was covered in rusty blotches. Red blotches. Neni looked at the creature with pity. The blotches were blood.
She hugged the dog to her, looking into its wide, despairing eyes. The eyes howled back at her: this is the smell of death. She was not a veterinary doctor, but she could tell when an animal was facing the moment of its death. This one had no more than two days to live, perhaps three. Casually, its owner had cast it off, had abandoned it alone in an alien place.
Neni cradled the unfortunate creature close to her and carried it into a small room at the end of the corridor. It was the sick bay for animals that were nearing their end. Neni would stay there, sleeping on a small creaking sofa, staying with the dog until death arrived.
Night had fallen several hours earlier and it was now approaching midnight. A tiny whine awoke her. Instantly her ears were alert. It won’t be long now, her heart told her. She got up and went to the creature.
A small dim light bulb sent a thin yellow luminescence through the room, scattering dark shadows in each corner. In this refuge for abandoned animals there were no luxuries. It was a small flimsy building, lit only by feeble light when the thick darkness of night enveloped it.
The light seemed to swirl around the room and form a dim circle. Neni knew this signaled death. The dog was struggling to breathe now; its tongue was hanging out, its eyes were yellow. It’s blind, thought Neni. A flash of heat seemed to scald her skin. She was expecting it. This is what she always felt whenever she kept watch over an animal approaching its end.
The dog was convulsing now. It legs protruded stiffly to one side, its lips had pulled back into a snarl exposing sharp teeth that glistened in the murky light. Drops of spittle flecked the floor. Neni watched motionless for several tense moments. The dog’s struggles slowly subsided. It looked up at Neni with a quiet gaze that seemed to speak gratitude that she was there. Its breath slowed, coming in short gasps. Its eyes closed. It died.
Neni was trembling. Sweat trickled down her back. She stroked the dog’s head, her eyes bright with compassion. Slowly tears crept down her cheeks, tears for a living creature. She stretched out her thin arms and gently lifted the furry body. She carried it out to the rear, away from the building.
And here she was. In the burial ground. Where dead creatures lie beneath the earth.
A crescent moon glowed in the sky, radiating pale light smeared with the smell of death. Neni turned away and looked up. She saw something flying above her, something dark like a shadow, that slid by swiftly and silently. Perhaps it was a bat, with its black wings and its feet full of claws. She couldn’t see it clearly. She was in a dark place scarcely touched by the light from the distant bare lightbulbs of the refuge.
Small reddish-yellow leaves swirled in the gusts of night air, silhouetted like rain. Like a drizzle of blood, Neni thought suddenly. She walked on along the rows of small grave markers.
She didn’t know how long there had been a burial ground behind the refuge. It had slowly materialized after the building was officially opened as a centre for animal lovers. Abused street animals on the edge of death, abandoned by their owners, lived on in the refuge; they grew old and eventually died. Others, brought in by their owners, were already near death and finally found sleep at the end of a needle administered by the veterinary doctors who were on duty ten hours a day, six days a week. All were buried at the rear of the refuge.
The small building itself was full of rooms. There was an infirmary for examining animals and a room where pets could be left. The big hall at the front was for stray animals. Many were in a distressed state. One eye. Three legs. Skin scorched hairless. Tails docked, faces pocked, ears half gone. And all of them afraid of people.
Neni had worked at the centre for many years. This was her home, this was her life. She was no different from the cats and dogs that, having lost a leg through amputation, limped along as she did.
The mist of nightfall arrived, slicing the air with its thin filaments. Neni stood tangled in the embrace of these filaments, sunk in the caress of the wind, enveloped in the sweet scent of tuberose flowers perfumed like the sweet smell of incense. Neni had come to love the perfume of the burial ground. She had become used to its rows of grave markers and she enjoyed its bottomless darkness. In the burial ground her thoughts always turned to her mother.
Slowly she made her way to an empty spot still devoid of a grave marker. She spread out an old blanket and placed the dog’s body on it. She picked up a hoe and began to dig.
Sixteen years before, Neni had been found in this burial ground. A newborn baby, still red, umbilical cord protruding from her belly, wailing with hunger. Her mother had abandoned her there. She lay alone, near the mound of a grave, as black ants began to crowd around her.
No one knew the baby was there. Night spread its wings. The refuge was in deep darkness. There were two night watchmen on duty, but both were at the front of the building. A cold wind began to blow, picking up the shells of dead flies and maggots. The baby’s mouth gaped, but its cries had been consumed by cold, pain and hunger. Pebbles had torn the soft lobe of its ear and blood oozed from the wound.
The baby closed its eyes. Blood-colored earth covered its body. Drops of dew fell around its chubby arms, flooding until it seemed to be floating a sea of blood. The baby’s breath was becoming labored.
A few moments later a dark shape flitted past. It was quick, as quick as a shadow riding the air. A wild, wandering, homeless thing. A thing probably looking for food in a garbage bin, scratching for a shred of meat or a lump of rice. The shape heard a sound, the whimper of a baby. It turned and peered, then it crouched and crept forward. Closer.
It’s all right, it whispered to the newborn baby. Shh, don’t cry. Mother is here.
Slowly the baby opened its eyes. Ants crawled over the tiny body, but they were quickly brushed off. The baby felt something—a warm body—settle beside it and embrace it, driving off and dispersing the chill wind. Something fleshy materialized in front of its lips. The baby opened its mouth and sucked. Sucked greedily. Clear, sweet wetness trickled into its throat. Its hunger and thirst disappeared. The baby suckled harder. With enjoyment.
Night exited into the wings of the stage. As the sun rose, staff from the animal refuge arrived one by one. They found the pink baby curled up in a corner of the burial ground, warm and protected in the embrace of a black cat.
Neni kept digging. The crescent moon still drifted in the sky, sending a dim light to the base of the earth. Neni bent her back, lifting the clods of earth one by one. When she had finished, she lifted the body of the dog, wrapped it in the blanket, and placed it gently in the hole. She stood up and, limping awkwardly, moved around the hole scattering handfuls of petals over the blanket, covering it completely with petals. The grave became a sea of petals.
Then she filled it in with earth.
It was over. Yet another life had passed into death.
Neni released a long breath. Goodbye.
She turned away.
At that moment the crescent moon reached its highest point in the dome of the sky. Its light filtered through the clouds. A cold wind descended with a pale mist, floating as fine as gossamer. Shadows flitted around her.
Neni felt a chill at the back of her neck, but she was smiling.
She was smiling at all the souls, the fine, translucent shapes, as they flitted back and forth across the burial ground. The spirits of dogs that had been shot. Of cats that had lost a leg, that had lost an eye, that limped along on three legs, their furless skin scorched black by fire. Stumps of tails. Pocked and battered faces. They were there, running among the graves, howling, meowing, snuffling. Their hoarse cries rose and flew hundreds of kilometers into the distance, into the dark dreams of people deep in sleep.
Neni limped to one of the graves.
Mother, how are you? I’ve brought you flowers, so you’ll always be happy.
Translated by George Quinn.